So, last night we got together to play a stand-alone mission from the Frostbite book. It was a chance to get a taste of the campaign missions, as well as break out the cool Frostbite and Damocles tiles.
Rob and Dave faced off in a mission called "Abandoned Base". As you can see from the initial setup photo, this mission combined a snow landscape with a contained building. Victory point objectives were scattered within the building - many close to entranceways. (We chose to ignore some of the special mission rules - in the interest of time, and some forgetfulness - which included icy surfaces in the snow as well as crated explosives within the base).
It was really damned impressive to see the terrain tiles put to use. It was quite a nice visual scene to see them combined with the barriers, crystals, and containers.
Dave's Karmans deployed out in the frozen waste, charging quickly across the snow. Rob's Cogs deployed within the Abandoned Base - his Cog units squeezing through the tight passages in a close formation. Orders were given on both sides to take cover and go into overwatch.
The first casualties of the night were Dave's K-Shooters, who popped out in full view of a Cog unit in overwatch and were quickly gunned down. (So quickly that I didn't get a chance to take a photo of them in action). After this point, both armies jockeyed for position - the Karmans clustering near a container and a Karman Crystal to gather valuable reinforcement points; while the Cogs spread out through the structure to control both containers and victory point objectives.
One of the most surprising exchanges of the night was when Dave shifted his K-Warriors (indirect fire artillery) into full view of the tightly-grouped Cog units and unleashed mortar fire. This eliminated a large number Cog infantry, and left a number of their units grounded and at risk for morale checks. It seriously weakened the Cog army, but the K-Warriors did not survive the return fire. There is no doubt that the K-Warriors are a great anti-infantry unit at the Karman's disposal.
Even weakened, the Cog were still able to fiercely control victory point objectives - and through the use of their AI-Beacons were able to conjure additional Type 1 combat striders to bolster their assault. The Karmans brought on some capable reinforcements, but they weren't enough to halt the advance of the Cog, who entrenched themselves around objectives and eventually wore down the Karman company. The Cog won the mission 20VP to 3VP - which sounds extremely lopsided, but the battle was a lot closer than the results showed.
I took the night off from playing in a mission to take some photographs and to rules lawyer. As it turned out, this battle didn't conclude until midnight, anyway.
